Reprieve for Ethanol? EPA Extends Comment Period on Biofuels
Ethanol and biodiesel industry groups reacted quite differently to EPA’s decision to extend public comment period on the Renewable Fuel Standard.
The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday said it was extending the comment period on a draft rule that aims to cut the greenhouse gases emitted by biofuels. The proposed changes to the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard, known as RFS-2, are an attempt to make the production of corn-based ethanol more efficient and increase the output of advanced biofuels.
- » See also: Biofuels Breakthrough: Making Fuel From Air With Engineered Microbes
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Ethanol industry welcomes comment period extension
“They only had a 60 day beginning comment period and this is between 1000 and 2000 pages of scientific and technical data,” said Tom Buis, CEO of ethanol industry group, Growth Energy. Buis, who said he was not surprised by the action added: “You don’t want to get a bad rule because people didn’t have the time to thoroughly analyze it.”
One of the major sticking points for the ethanol industry in the RFS have been the international land use provisions that are being incorporated into lifecycle greenhouse gas analyses required by the RFS.
In a letter written to House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson last week, Bob Dinneen, President of the Renewable Fuels Association wrote that EPA’s proposed rule “failed a basic test that government regulation be based upon science that is transparent, reliable and verifiable. The science of market-mediated, secondary international land use impacts is nascent, at best, and clearly needs time for scientific consensus to develop and less reliance on unproven assumptions,” wrote Dinneen.
Biodiesel industry concerned about impact of delaying final rule
Biodiesel industry representatives fear that the extended comment period would provide additional hardship to the U.S. biodiesel industry.
“RFS-2 was supposed to be in place at the beginning of this year, and extension of the comment period could further delay the implementation of the program,” the National Biodiesel Board said in a statement.
RFS-2 requires the use of 500 million gallons of biomass-based diesel in 2009. And biodiesel industry representatives say it may be the only fuel currently available in the market to meet that requirement. “Given the extension of the RFS-2 comment period, it is only appropriate that EPA take immediate steps to ensure that the 2009 volume goals provided for in statute are met,” said the NBB statement.
The comment period on the rule will now end on September 25 instead of July 27.
Image via jurvetson under a Creative Commons license
if some biofuels are truly carbon neutral then there will be no worry about Green house gases.
Time to Purge the EPA:
House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson criticized the EPA for low-balling environmental footprint credits for byproduct distiller’s grains and corn oil, and also for ignoring dramatic energy efficiency improvements installed in the newest wave of ethanol refineries.
Peterson criticized the EPA for “being in bed with the oil industry”. He objected to the EPA’s attempt to restrict the biofuels industry, without holding the oil industry to the same high standards. Peterson reacted strongly to EPA’s unfair application of Indirect Land Use Change, an unproven, unscientific theory based on false assumptions, introduced by an attorney. Thousands of scientists have scoffed at it.
During the past few years, the rate of rain forest deforestation has actually gone down, while biofuels production has increased. This invalidates Indirect Land Use Change theory. The ravenous paper pulp industry in Indonesia, and the illegal hit and run timber taking in the Amazon Rainforest are the origins of deforestation, not biofuels. Palm plantations are another factor in Indonesia, however, over 70% of palm oil is used for human consumption, not biofuels. The majority of rainforest that has been destroyed in the Amazon, is being used for cattle ranching and subsistence farming, not biofuels. This has been going on for decades, long before biofuels expanded. Green Peace reports the same findings.
The EPA has been caught following UN policy, rather than its own domestic policy based on in-house factual scientific research. This is a strategy that covertly favors big oil, by blaming competing biofuels for Climate Change. Collin Peterson and many others do not want the EPA to restrict our growing domestic biofuels industry, which is an important part of National Security and Energy Independence.
The EPA is secretly playing games and twisting information: See “EPA Official Wrong on Ethanol and Biodiesel Yields” by Cindy Zimmerman, Domestic Fuel. Margo Oge, the EPA official responsible for regulating the entire U.S. biofuels industry for emissions, cannot tell you how many gallons of ethanol you get out of an acre of corn, or how many tons of byproduct livestock feed. Yet when it comes to calculating emissions, those figures are vital. It appears that the people in the shadows of the EPA are spoon-feeding Margo Oge. When it comes to basic biofuel facts, she doesn’t have a clue.
Another story just broke exposing the EPA: Expert senior research analyst, Alan Carlin, having worked at the EPA for 38 years, wrote an in-house report criticizing the agency’s stance on Global Warming. Carlin’s report was suppressed by fellow EPA officials, who also instructed him to remain silent and not to talk to the press.
Carlin went ahead and broke his silence anyway. Carlin’s banned in-house report exposed the EPA for following UN policy, instead of policy based on their own research. Regarding global warming and unproven indirect land use change theory, UN policy is an instrument infiltrated by big oil to blame biofuels - using manipulated information and premature conclusions - See “Suppressed EPA scientist breaks silence, speaks on Fox News”, by Mark Tapscott.
The EPA is also playing the omission game. EPA way underestimates the cost and the environmental impact of petroleum based fuels – as they compare to biofuels. By omission, EPA fails to include the cost and the environmental impact to secure and protect American Foreign Oil Interests. A Rand Report called “Does Imported Oil Threaten U.S. National Security?” states that protecting America’s Middle East oil interests costs the United States 12-15% of its entire 2008 defense budget every year – A huge amount of money, resources, bunker fuel and diesel fuel burned, and a long distance supply line to provide this protection.
The EPA also disguises the true environmental impact of Petroleum based fuels by using old or slanted information. For the footprint of petroleum, the EPA used pre-tar sands data. This does not reflect more recent crude oil extracted from Canadian tar sands – which consumes twice the energy of conventional ground wells. Tar sands oil extraction is also a major source of deforestation. Imported Oil is also transported thousands of miles by ocean going ships burning Bunker Fuel, one of the biggest causes of Global Warming and Black Carbon.
Our concept of Global Warming itself is flawed. A one or two degree temperature change, every twenty years, is not going to melt glaciers and polar ice caps. We have been making the assumption that they have been receding due to excessive CO2 suspended in the atmosphere. That may be a factor, but it’s not the main cause. It’s Black Carbon, from burning Coal, Bunker Fuel, Dirty Diesel, partially burned Gasoline, and anything that suspends SOOT into the atmosphere - Soot precipitating out of the air and onto the surface of snow and ice. The heat of the sun is absorbed by this layer of Black Carbon, and this is what’s causing the melting, not the higher levels of CO2 we have today.
What we need to do is reduce and eliminate Black Carbon Soot. Mainly from burning fossil fuels. To fulfill its hidden agenda, the EPA is cooking the books on fuels causing Black Carbon Soot, and instead, fingering the biofuels which replace them.
President Obama, with all due respect, you need to get your house in order. Start by auditing and purging the corruption in the EPA.
The Carlin story, to put it politely, is a crock. Alan Carlin’s report was an unsolicited regurgitation of “skreptic” talking points, lifted in large part from contrarian blogs and “astro turf” organizations with well documented links to the oil industry. The central premise and four key sections were cut and pasted from Patrick Michaels’ World Climate Report, without any attribution whatsoever.
See:
http://deepclimate.org/2009/06/28/epas-alan-carlin-channels-pat-michaels-and-the-friends-of-science/
http://deepclimate.org/2009/06/30/suppressed-carlin-report-based-on-pat-michaels-attack-on-epa/
Should they re-name it the MEPA? Mid-East Petro Association, fits just fine don’t you think
An attempt to make the production of corn-based ethanol more efficient? They couldn’t spare the cash to invest in efficient incandescent bulbs, clean coal, or cold fusion?
Of course the head of the National Biodiesel Board (or the RFA) will kick and scream at any mention of any science that might hurt his profit margin. He will pay consultants to cobble together rebuttals. It’s what he is paid to do. He will fight any and all science no matter how good, no matter how much. You can’t expect him to ever say, “Huh, your science is airtight alright. Boys, clean out your desks. We’ve made a terrible mistake here!”
The only way to blunt this food based boondoggle is to educate the public and force the politicians hands out of the pockets of the lobbyists. Science is never settled. Go visit the Creation Museum. Here is a short, incomplete list of some of the science from the past decade. The legislation mandating food based biofuel use wasn’t based on science.
http://home.comcast.net/~russ676/biodiesel/page3.html
All I hear about is how 10% ethanol has already reduced mileage on my auto the 15% ethanol will reduce my mileage even more and will likely damage my engine. I say go ahead with the additional ethanol with the following conditions.
1. Drastically reduce the cost of ethanol laced gas.
2. Guarantee everyone that if engine damage occurs because of the additional ethanol, the ethanol producers repair all vehicles affected without crying foul or making up some far fetched story about how they are not at fault.